#i know wip can mean any. work in progress. but i figured i'd do both bc it has colloquial meaning yknow

[callixton]

hello theo tell me abt one of your current wips! 💜

hi maya !!

hmm i will talk a little bit abt a fic and a play that i wanna start working on more seriously soon!

anyway i have this merrily fic that i desperately want to finish which jumps around chronologically and explores a version of events where frank and charley have been sort of hooking up platonically since college and mary is still in love with frank and she doesn't know and it all comes out like. wayy too late for it to be okay and it's a mess. and nobody really gets resolution but hopefully i get a little catharsis

and then! i'm working on an explicitly queer bacchae retelling that i've been turning around in my head for a good while now but am having trouble getting to shape. i want it to be at least partially set in a gay club and pentheus' repression is a huge component and there's gonna be some sort of parallel w the whole agave thing with a drag mother..... idk i have very clear aesthetic and thematic ideas for it and now i just need to make it Work. luckily! i am in a playwriting class this semester and one of the prompts happens to be about writing an adaptation so i am going to take advantage of that to get the first 10-15 pages in place.

[nerdieforpedro]

Wednesday WIP

Hello! 👋🏽 Nerdie here, I am working on a few things:

1. A second entry for @undercoverpena ‘s April Showers Challenge (maybe featuring an agent I haven’t written for a bit). I had a burst of an idea which was different than the original one I had. Such is a Nerdie brain. Don't get lost in there, but there are cookies.

2. Finally progress of my “Wedding 101 with Dieter” fic! I had been having trouble with it. I’m happy to have more Maya, Dieter and Daisy. 🤭 I apologize to @angelofsmalldeath-codeine in advance for any undue stress I shall cause you.

3. Going to finish up my short Frankie body part series which sounds menacing but is the opposite. 😂 Very much so lol It’s called “Only Parts of you Mr. Morales.”

4. I’m working on a Javier Peña series because I feel like I need to give him something nice. Just one thing. 😆 It's very sweet, I have 2 chapters and no idea what to call it. Pfft, go figure. No idea how long it will be - sorry, won't be ready for a bit. Between Javier P and Joel recent. I need to be nice to them. They’re both very haunted. 😖

5. I'm still working on both Din fics and Benny. I'm redoing the outlines. Bullet points are friends and not our enemies. I think. Will there be more random Star Wars people? Is Obi Wan Kenobi a children’s author and Luke that old man who swings his lightsaber in the yard?! Both these things are true. 😌 Messing with Star Wars canon one character at a time. 😂😂😂 The sweet Din fic will remain so. My walking pile of nervous Beskar. 💚

And that's about it, I've cut back a bit on writing to do more school work (papers...ugh...writing about not Pedro. 👀 Eww...)

Previews under the cut:

Anyway, somehow, I went from being stuck in chapter five for 'Weddings 101 with Dieter' to now being in chapter six. I'd like to thank Hemmy for being so encouraging and @megamindsecretlair for discussing Pedro and Oscar with me the other night. I feel like I should make notes and keep both of those in mind for future fics because it's the right thing to do.🫡 Just thinking about it is… 🫠

This is a small excerpt from chapter six, we should all know Nerdie's humor by now 🤣:

“Who’s banging on my door this damn early?! You better get out of here!” “Dee at least ask who it is.” “I don’t care, it could be the president, pope or, no Beyonce could come in.” “I am not meeting Beyonce in my robe. My hair is a mess, my face is puffy, I haven’t showered yet…that’s not who it is!” “I mean, if she shows up on this door, she’s gonna have to be okay with my bare ass, balls and your robe with your cute puffy face. It’s just us. You don’t need one. I’m just going to take it back off to eat you for-” “MR. BRAVO IT’S ME ZACK! YOUR ASSISTANT!” He screamed, he didn’t need to hear Dieter removing anything off of Maya or eating her in any capacity, they can do that after he leaves later. Never any filter with this damn man, he just needs to remind himself of his loans. This job pays the loans.

Gotta love how....open Dieter is with everything. Even Sasha Fierce is not safe. 😭

Second is from my pending Javier Peña fic (I'll think of a good name, I swear!):

Meeting his gaze had her mouth run dry, the sandy tone to his skin contrasted with more papaya tones in his neck. Dark hair and kind eyes behind a gold pair of aviators perched on his curved nose. Tourmaline waves parted on the left side of his crown were matched by his bold eyebrows and thick mustache. His lips were a lace pink and plush. The sunlight made the sweat along his neck glimmer, accentuating its definition. The light blue shirt made the reds and browns in his skin stand out even more. “Did you need to get some fresh air too?” She asked, he could be doing that, escaping someone like she was doing or something else entirely. Now she was curious too, about this man who’d chosen to sit next to her.

I very much enjoy my description of Javier, hehe 😉

That's it! Normally I have more, but it's either still in bullet form or in my head. 🤭

NPT: @maggiemayhemnj @604to647 @connectioneverywhere @morallyinept @rhoorl

@goodwithcheese @soft-persephone @djarinmuse @pedroshotwifey @magpiepills

@secretelephanttattoo @tinytinymenace @inept-the-magnificent @soft-girl-musings @mysterious-moonstruck-musings

@laurfilijames @grogusmum @alltheglitterandtheroar @jessthebaker @musings-of-a-rose

@julesonrecord @wannab-urs @schnarfer

[the-eyes-of-andyserkis]

"Bringin' Home the Rain" Chapter 5 progress update + some WIPs, why not!

Klaue

"Bringin' Home the Rain" - Chapter 5 - Foundations

It's definitely still a ways off from being finished, but progress is being made! I'm happy to say that it's pretty much all on the page, so to speak, and is also already just over 6k as a rough draft with plenty of filling out to be done, so it will easily be the longest chapter. And it's pretty well, uhh, all smut. 🥴

At any rate, there's no set date for this yet but at least I can really get going with the "macro" edit!

"Salvation is a Deep Dark Well" - Part two of the BHTR series

We're definitely not done after chapter five! I realized pretty early on after starting to rework this that Klaue and Reader were going to keep at it (😉), but rather than add more chapters to what is now "part one", it felt like it made more sense to create a separate fic since there will likely be a small time jump, and it'll be spread over a longer period of time as they continue to get up to ✨️shenanigans✨️.

"Find Me in the Air" - Part three of the BHTR series

I'm planning on this essentially being a sort of extended epilogue (and I do basically know how this will end). While it's still rough at this point, it will definitely be at least three parts/chapters, like a series of one shots over an even longer period of time before I wrap things up.

"Hiding From the Sun" - sub!Klaue one-shot

Self explanatory. 😉 *raises eyebrows aggressively* Also, shout out to The Next Big Franchise discord for, uh, awakening something in me/us. 😈

Alfred Pennyworth

As yet untitled Alfred x F Reader series

Set in "The Batman" universe

This one keeps changing it's damn shape on me, and the title continues to elude me, but I think I've settled on a sort of "established relationship" series. Maybe. 😂 Either way, I'm not going to settle on a specific number of chapters at this point, as I feel like this may be more open-ended. Listen, I have thots and they need to go somewhere, so I'll figure it out eventually!

"Lotus" - Yoga Instructor AU Alfred x F Reader one-shot

Inspired by the lovely @tarabyte3's AU PT!Kino idea! ❤️ Also by going to my first class in ages and after internally debating for about two seconds which Andy blorbo would make a good yoga instructor before immediately realizing that Alfred would be perfect.

Alfred started exploring yoga to help with his injury and enjoyed and appreciated it so much that he started teaching. You're taken aback by the handsome, and older, new instructor who's very much outside of the usual demographic, and when he starts offering private sessions you nervously sign up.

This will be either one or two parts, we'll see how it shakes out!

"Fealty" (working title) - Arthurian Legend inspired AU Alfred x F OC series

I just got inspiration for this one yesterday! Plot twist: Alfred is the Lord/King and OC is a Knight (so is Bruce, of course), and in this universe both women and men are Knights. I'm lightly planning for this to be three to five chapters at this point, but again this is very new and liable to change. Mutual pining, forbidden love, slow burn, all that good stuff.

I'm making a list of some books and movies for research, and if anyone has recommendations for some universe-building inspiration, I'm open to suggestions!

Damn, five months ago I had no idea I'd actually be almost finished my first fic in years (and first multi-chapter fic, period), let alone have a list of WIPs/ideas! Thank you to everyone who has commented and encouraged me thus far, it's means more than you know. 🥰

Header by me | Divider by @saradika.

[acacia-may]

Have asked already? Gosh, I getting tired! 3, 55, 73 and 96 <3

Hello friend! No, you hadn't asked already, but thank you so much for this one! I'd be happy to answer these questions for you!! 🥰

3. On a scale of 1-10 how much do you enjoy incorporating romance into the average story?

In general, probably a 1 or (a very generous) 2, but I think it really depends on the story. I'll admit I will sometimes use romance as a plot device or just to make jokes and then I have a little fun with it, but I took this question to mean legitimate and serious incorporation of romance, in which case it's generally not my cup of tea and even if it's a pairing that I really like, I don't find a lot of enjoyment in it because I don't have a lot of practice writing romance and really get in my own head & worried that I'm going to mess it up. Meet-Cutes and Established Relationships are okay (because they're not super dependent on me being able to write a compelling relationship progression), but when it comes to writing characters actually falling in love or focusing on them deepening their relationship, I get really nervous because I know that's not my strength as a writer.

This is true even when I have a pairing that I made up myself. I had my sister laughing at me when for my self-indulgent birthday fic, I actually wrote our OC into the story but kept her relationship with her (eventual after a decades long slow burn) love interest platonic on purpose. My sister was editing and there's this scene where they like unintentionally brush hands and she just stops and says, "It's your birthday. You know, you can make this relationship super romantic if you want," but I was like "No. I don't think I will. I like them as friends." Cue my sister just deadpan blinking and pointing out, "You literally made her up just to eventually marry him [under these ultra-specific circumstances]" And yeah, that's technically true, but if it's up to me and what I enjoy writing, I prefer writing them as friends (with like optional, super subtle somewhat romantic undertones). I don't mind the hints at possible romantic feelings, but when it comes to anything overt, I think it stresses me out to write more than I find enjoyment in it.

But that's just me. I have nothing against romance on principle. I just don't trust myself to write it and find more enjoyment in writing even my favorite pairings as friends or in an intentionally ambiguous relationships. I have been trying to push myself to write more romance, but I don't think I'll ever consider it a strong suit of mine and I go out of my way to avoid it. In the series I mentioned above which actually does have a CC x OC pairing in it that's actually integral to the plot, the (eventual) couple didn't even officially meet until literally over 55,000 words into the story. And now they're just going to be friends for like 10 years before any dating happens. The story is just not about that. This is what I mean when I say I don't do romance lol 😅😂

But I do try my best because I want to grow as a writer. It's just when the question asks "how much do I personally enjoy writing romance," the answer is not much at all (even for an OTP or a ship I made up myself).

55. Do you have any abandoned WIP’s? What made you abandon them?

Yes. Too many to count 😭 In most cases, I lost momentum, changed interests, moved on from the fandom, or just couldn't figure out how to make the story work. I also tend to get distracted by other projects and ideas. I'd like to return to some of my wips someday because it bothers me to leave things unfinished (especially if part of them had been posted), but we'll see.

73. How do you visualize scenes? do you see it like a movie in your head, or do the words just flow?

Both actually, so it kind of depends. When I'm initially planning/drafting a scene, I see it like a movie (often watching the scenes from the eyes of my POV character, though occasionally watching from the outside like an actual audience). When I'm ready to start writing, I can actually see the words I want to write like I'm reading them. That's generally when I know I'm ready to sit down and get typing (because otherwise I'm just outlining or mapping out scenes in my head).

96. Romantic/social sideplots: interesting or irritating?

It really depends on the work and on why that subplot is in there, but in general my favorite kinds of romance in all of fiction have always been subplots. Honestly, I think if I listed my favorite ships of all time they were all romantic subplots in stories that were otherwise just not about that, and I really liked that because I could enjoy them without them overtaking the story and overshadowing all of the other meaningful (platonic) relationships.

But, on the flip side, I think I am very sensitive to and adverse to "romance for the sake of romance" or just when a ship is shoved into a story gratuitously without it making sense or needing to be there beyond the creators deciding "well there has to be romance somewhere." Like...no, there doesn't have to be romance in anything, ever. In fact sometimes there probably shouldn't be.

Some of my least favorite ships of all time fit in this "romance for the sake of romance" category because it just feels so forced, unnecessary, and uncomfortable to me. But to be fair there are even pairings that I genuinely like & would have even said I "ship," and I still get sour & upset when they get forced together at the end of the story just because it's the end, when I feel they're not ready and/or there wasn't proper build up. In those cases, even though I technically shipped the ship & wanted to see them together eventually, I would have preferred if they hadn't forced it and had just left the relationship open ended.

This is an extremely random example but since I just changed my profile picture to Naomi & Gabe... Elena of Avalor actually did this open-ended ship thing really well imo, and I am immensely grateful that the creators stuck to their promise not to give Elena a canonical love interest at the end since she had so much going on in her life and her story and character journey was never about that. No matter how much I (and from what I've seen, a whole lot of the fandom) want her to (eventually) end up with Mateo, it was NOT the time and this show did not play. They literally had a magical alpaca cut off Mateo's ill-timed almost love-confession at the "expected" (but objectively bad) moment, and it was AMAZING! This was hard core and has my ULTIMATE RESPECT.

So yeah...it's a very fine line between compelling & irritating and understandable & forced when it comes to romance subplots. I think when romance subplots are done well and thoughtfully they can be super compelling and interesting, but when they're done badly or are thrown in there "just because," it's honestly kind of the worst... 😝

When it comes to my own writing, if romance is going to be in there, it is probably going to be a subplot and I hope it's not too irritating lol. 😅 Even in a "romance" story, I feel like the romance is usually still a subplot because it's vying for attention with the friendship between the characters in the ship or their own personal struggles as people or (more often than not) one the character's strained/otherwise complicated relationship with their sibling(s) or family members [i.e. all my fics that have any romance for either of the Spatial Mage Brothers are also heavily focused on the brothers' relationship with each other in addition to their respective romantic ships. I just can't seem to write Finral x Finesse or Langris x Finesse or Finral x Vanessa or ect. ect. without Finral & Langris' platonic brothers' relationship being in there too, at least to some extent]. I find it hard to get into a story when the only thing in it is romance personally, so I prefer when it's a subplot or just one part of a story with multiple things going on.

[tippenfunkaport]

WIPs Status Update

I am fairly confident no one cares what I am up to, but I haven't done one of these in ages so I figured I should.

In Progress Fanfic

Outlaws of the Whispering Woods

This fic is on temporary hiatus because I'm working on finishing it as part of the @wipbigbang. Participation in that event means I can't update that fic again until the posting period starts on September 8th BUT that once that posting period begins, I should have both art for the new chapter as well as regular updates through November until the fic is done which should be exciting. 

That said, there is still like 60k ish to go in that story so if it looks like I'm not going to be able to get it all done in time, I might swap it out for the Chipped Glimmer fic which has also been languishing in WIP hell because it's shorter and easier for me to get done on time. I'd prefer to use the event as a kick in the pants to finish OotWW, though, so we'll see.

Prince Glowyn the Fourth

This fic is 100% complete at last, I just have one chapter left to post and will be doing that sometime within the next week.

Going There

Just about four years after I started it, Going There is finally done as well! (Literally just finished it today!) "Done" in this case means I finally rewrote the back end and filled in the missing connecty bits I never wrote the first time so everything's written, it's just going to take me an unknown quantity of time to edit and post each of the chapters. But less time than rewriting it all took so I expect those last few updates to come fairly regularly once I get them started.

Coming Home

I have always said that I wanted to wait to continue this fic until Going There was done so now that I have finally finished it, the sequel can get my attention more regularly again. That said, with everything going on with the WIP Bang, posting the rest of Going There, running the Big Bang and posting my own Bang fic (plus, like, all the other IRL stuff i have to do this summer), I really don't anticipate getting it updated anytime before the fall at the earliest and even then who knows.

Also, because this is my last in-progress canon fic I'm not in a huge rush to get it out there, I'd rather take my time with it, so I'm fine with that timeline. It'll get updated when it gets updated.

Area First Ones

In my head, this is episodic and while i have five chapters written, I have some things I want to add in between so it's not as simple as just cleaning and posting those. So basically, this one will be one of those fics I update when I update here and there with no set timeline other than my whims.

Coming Soon!

My Big Bang fic is called Horse Girl Everyone and it's the long awaited Riding School AU! 

That one is going to be longgggg and basically never-ending and episodic (seriously, we're over 50k words and while Catradora have been circling each other for chapters Glimmer and Bow literally only just met and you KNOW how I feel about Glimbow). I was hoping to write enough in advance that I could do some kind of regular update schedule at the start but because I'm also running the Bang and having some annoying medical stuff going on, I think that's not happening.

I've written a ton in advance, don't get me wrong, I just don't see myself having time to revise it all and post weekly with everything else going on. But we'll see!

Anything else?

Well, yeah, lots of stuff but it's not fandom related so I can't tell you about it. ;-) Though maaaaybe I might have the chance for some of you to help me beta some of my original stuff in the near future if you're willing so keep an eye out for that.

I'm trying to have less things in progress at once so, though I have other fanfic projects in various states of completion, I'm purposely not going to even think about posting any other multi-chaps until GT and OotWW are done. 

One shots and shorts? Yeah, I'll be throwing those up randomly as the mood strikes, you know how I roll. I'm eyeing up the Domaystic 2024 prompts to see which ones call to me right now.

So I have other stuff planned for later but I'm not even going to tease it because we'll see how everything shakes out.

This year has actually been absolutely horrible health wise but weirdly productive writing wise so it's been a mixed bag but at least nice to get some stuff done!

[miceenscene]

What was your writing process with the first SoPDoE story? For example, did you have a general concept for the story outlined ahead of writing it, or did you write first and see where it took you? Or maybe your process was totally different--I'd love to know any of your experience and process that you're willing to share!

Did you learn anything while writing it that may help other writers in terms of writing a longfic, improving craft, etc?

I'm going to go ahead and put this beneath a cut because I can already tell it's going to be long. :P also SoPDoE spoiler warning?

SoPDoE began as a spite fic. I read (well, started reading) a different shakarian arranged marriage au and found myself frustrated that the plot wasn't being handled the way I wanted it to be--which is really the best way to begin a story because it means you have an Opinion. The first chapter just sprang forth fully formed [their parallel "Absolutely Not" answers and Garrus' "With all due respect, what the fuck?" and Shepard just verbally bitch-slapping in their first interaction]. And then major pathways became clear very quickly. I knew that the Council was going to break them up quite early on in the writing. I knew that Galena dying would be a major catalyst to push them together. But some things came later, like the whole Garrus starting a Pier Earth Imports for Shepard plot-line came. And a whole slew of kissing scenes had to be removed/reworded because their relationship arc wasn't making sense for the drama I wanted in act III. (I did save those scenes, btw. they're in a doc called Kissing Graveyard XD)

There's this concept you've probably already come across of plotters vs. pant-sers. Aka writers who plot out their whole stories before beginning writing and writers who just jump into the story without anything planned more than the next sentence. If I had to pick, I'm definitely in the plotters, but realistically, I'm in both. I like knowing where the general flow of the story is going, even if I'm not sure how to get there or what getting there will actually look like. For SoPDoE, I always knew that Garrus & Shepard would finish the story Together, but the exact details of Together changed over time as the story progressed. (At one point Garrus & Shep were duo spectres, till I realized that would make no sense for a turian who just turned his back on the whole Hierarchy.) And that's really the best way to do things, at least in my opinion. You have your heading so you have momentum, but you also aren't so driven that you can't stop and smell the roses along the journey.

I think the biggest thing that SoPDoE taught me was how much work goes into writing a whole-ass novel. Knowing that makes me feel better about starting wip's that I eventually abandon, because I know that the idea wasn't worth the effort. It's a good way to grant myself permission to move on and find the next idea that actually Is worth the effort.

The other thing SoPDoE taught me was how to keep myself engaged in a story. People write for all different reasons and when I began I don't think I knew what mine was. I know now. SoPDoE was catharsis for me. Garrus was my self-insert in this fic, especially through the Galena plot line as I am also losing a parent to a long drawn-out terminal illness that will one day take a sudden turn for the end. This is what they mean when they say Write What You Know. But besides catharsis, SoPDoE and all of my writing really are performance. I love having an audience beyond just my wonderful readers. I have a close circle of friends who see my stuff before anyone else does. I trust their opinion, their critique; I strive to surprise them, to delight them, to make them bust into my DM's in a frothing rage. They've taught me so much about writing, and they are who I write for when I can't write for myself. If you can figure out what type of carrot will keep you plodding along the path of writing, you'll be leagues ahead of so many.

As far as improving craft, the best advice I can give is to write. You gotta write. Better to write a full page of utter garbage than to not write anything at all. Even the garbage will teach you something.

[crymeariveronceagain]

Oh, those are interesting stories! I only really have one original story and it can essentially be summed up as “Eldritch-adjacent person adopts eight children” Anyway, do you prefer writing original stories or fan works? Which writing of yours are you most proud of?

soooo like Tiergan??? /j No, seriously though, I would read the absolute heck out of that. Good adoptive parents will never cease to make me happily emotional. I'd love to read a story about an Eldritch creature person adopting smol humans.

I... I'm currently not sure.

I like writing fanfic because, to put it bluntly, it's easy. I don't have to put a ton of work into characters, I don't find it difficult to come up with plots. It's all nice and right there and I can grab it and go. It doesn't mean it doesn't take work, I'm currently stuck on my current WIP, and it's taking a hot sec to figure it out, but fanfic is easier for me.

However, none of it is wholly mine. So, you know, there is that. I really like writing original works. I like having something completely and wholly mine. I like making my own characters, my own worlds, my own things.

But fanfiction is a TON more fun. It's hard work, but it's scarily fun. But then again, so is making my own original work. Idk. I guess I like both of them pretty equally.

The writing work I'm most proud of overall is honestly probably The Princess And The Popstar, just because it's so long and it got such *hair flip* rave reviews.

However, Unbroken is extremely close to my heart, and I think the ending of that story is one of the best things I've put time into.

Of my own original work, honestly, I'm most proud of this beginning of a story.

Loisa Von Trout never liked anyone. All the ladies at The Official Walforte Bridge-Club knew that. That’s why, when Loisa ranted on and on about her neighbors, no one really thought twice about it.

However, Mary-Jane Fawkson, who lived over on Garden Street, the next street over from Loisa, who lived on Falcon Avenue, was the sweetest most darling woman any of the bridge-club members had ever met. They couldn’t help loving her. So, when Mary-Jane joined in with Loisa, they were shocked.

Actually, shocked would be an understatement. They were stunned into complete silence, cards and every other interesting topic forgotten. A rarity, among the eight women.

“Blue hair,” Mary-Jane agreed with Loisa, “The mark of the devil, I’m sure.”

“Oh, no, Love,” Said Ellen Abram, who was the youngest and most progressive of the group, at the youthful age of seventy-two, “Blue hair is quite a fad now-a-days, you know.”

“And pierced ears?” snapped Loisa, her expression souring, “On a young man?”

A few glances went around the table, concern and tension filling the silence that followed. “Are you sure, Loisa,” said Rose, gently, “You know your eyesight has been on its way out the door,” She smiled at the ladies, “Just like my knees.”

Chuckles met that, and Loisa’s expression soured even more. “I daresay not. One could see those earrings from a block-a-way, I do declare. They were upside-down crosses.”

The chuckles died away, and Ellen said, softly, “Surely not, Loisa.”

Mary-Jane shook her head, “I do agree with Loisa. There is something terribly off about that family.”

“Something off in the family? I thought just the boy was the trouble. Oh, heavens.”

“What is it, Brenda?”

“He’ll be dallying with our granddaughters before the fall!”

Panic swept the table as a new wave of fear overrode everything else.

Marjorie snorted. “Not my granddaughter, at any rate. She’s off saying she’s a plant. The things those kids get into these days.”

The other ladies spared a moment to scowl at Marjorie. Ellen said, clipped, “Just because your granddaughter thinks she’s a plant, doesn’t mean our granddaughters aren’t in any danger of falling prey to this young delinquent.”

“I do hope my son raised my dear Theodosia better than that,” Loisa snapped, her sharp voice carrying over the table. “Twould be a shame if he were to show up on the doorstep one evening.”

((Spoilers: He totally showed up on the doorstep one evening.))

[ladyaj-13]

My 2021 Fic Fests

Thank you @cyantific and @chloehl10 for tagging me to share the fic fests I was part of in 2021! I'm not a huge fest participant, mainly because I don't like signing up for things I might not be able to complete and I don't like pressure, but I did a couple!

Number of fests: 2

Number of fics written: 3

Favourite fest/fic: I only did 1D Trick or Treat Fest and the 1D Christmas fest, but I loved that in both I was able to decide to join in late on (Trick or Treat with no sign-ups and Christmas with the late call for more stories), which really suits me and my writing system (i.e., there is no system. Whatever comes out comes out, whenever it wants). I also like all the stories I wrote in different ways. If I had to pick one, I’d say Little Saint Nick, because it was barely a spark of an idea and then it snowballed (heh) as I sat down to try it out.

Fests you would love to do again this year (if they come back!): I’d do both of these again! The Trick or Treat fest is a great writing exercise with the 666 word limit, and who doesn’t love a Christmassy fic? I’ve also signed up for big bang, and I'd love to do the poly fic fest but I don’t think I’m going to make the Jan 30th deadline as I really should concentrate on the BB at this point… Wordplay last year looked fun as well. HOWEVER I have a list as long as my arm of projects I’m writing/want to write, so I do like if I can use something in-progress to fit the fest instead of following prompts and ending up with even more WIPs.

@cyantific added in Fic Fest you wish existed and I love that idea - although I note they're hoping to run their fest and I don’t have the capacity at this point to take on something like that! Fic fest mods are heroes. However, I would love more fests that focus on non-Larry. I love Larry, don’t get me wrong (my BB will be Larry!), but I think people need less encouragement for Larry fics, with their guaranteed readership. As a rare pair reader, rare pair-focused stories are also harder to find (unless you use ‘otp: true’ on AO3, or exclude all the Larry fics - but that’s almost useless for Ziam given how often Ziam and Larry go hand in hand) so a collection is like hitting jackpot. My personal favourites are Lilo, Tomlinshaw and Nouis, because I’m a Louis girl, so any of those three… well, I’d certainly consider selling my soul even if I didn’t go through with it.

My fics below the cut…

My contribution to fests in 2021: (In chronological order)

1. 1D Trick or Treat fest - Ghostbesties (Zayn and Louis) @1dtrickortreatfest

I had this idea kicking around and when I saw the fest it was the perfect excuse to finish it and keep it concise! It took a lot of revision to stick to 666 words but it was really interesting to work within such a constraint. And the reception to fics in this fest was amazing, even for my little gen fic. So many comments and kudos! I love.

2. 1D Christmas Fest - A Kiss for Christmas (Lilo) @1dchristmasfest

I saw the late call for stories for this fest and figured I’d give writing something short and sweet a go, and this was the result. It’s a weird mix of Louis’ vaguely horny internal monologue, childhood toys, and Liam as the son of Father Christmas. I don’t know. I don’t know where it came from but I honestly love it. Also I think(?) there were four non-Larry main pairings in this fest, and I wrote two of them, so happy to help with that variety :D

3. 1D Christmas Fest - Little Saint Nick (Tomlinshaw) @1dchristmasfest

I kind of didn’t mean to write this (I wasn’t even sure if the fest accepted multiple stories by the same author at the time) but a tiny half idea became this whole big thing (nearly 11k! That wasn’t the plan!) when I sat down and figured I’d give it half an hour to see if it had legs. It has canon Nick but AU Louis, supernatural elements and touches on some darker themes, and writing it was a real adventure. And I just realised they end up talking about sheep again, like they do in one of my other Tomlinshaw fics… why do I associate Tomlinshaw with sheep?!?

An absolutely huge thank you to everyone who organised a fest last year for encouraging the production of so many great stories! As a writer, I loved dipping my toe into fests, and as a reader I threw myself in wholeheartedly, so thank you for the hours of entertainment.

I feel like I’m getting to this a bit late, so probably most people have been tagged? If not, consider this yours!